The Arcanist (2 page)

But even as he prepared himself for death someone smashed into him. A shape, a form in a guard’s uniform. and then suddenly he was being carried away from the collapsing wall in a sprint. Carried probably faster than he'd ever run in his entire life, while behind him the immense stone blocks began smashing down.

People were killed instantly, crushed into bloody rags. Stone turned to dust all around him. The floor shook as though a giant was jumping up and down on it. And all he knew was that he was being carried away from it. Carried to safety. Although just then the world outside looked a little like what he thought the underworld might look like.

Outside in the courtyard the guard handed him to several others, before suddenly collapsing to his knees. Possibly he'd been injured though more likely he guessed, the man was simply winded from his exertions. Either though was still a better condition than that of many others. So many others!

As he got to his feet and surveyed the remains of his castle, Byron knew that many others were in far worse shape than him and his guardsman. Even among the survivors. But behind him, somewhere in the massive clouds of dust that were billowing out of the broken castle, were bodies. Scores of them. People who had once been his guests and his friends and his loyal servants, were now gone; killed by the stampeding mammoths and falling masonry. The outer courtyard wall was gone. An entire wing of the castle had collapsed and in the darkness he wasn't sure that the rest would keep standing. But that was only the beginning of the disaster. The beasts might have stampeded through the castle but they hadn't stopped there.

Through the broken castle walls he could see evidence of damage done to other buildings. Even in the darkness it was obvious. It seemed that the heart of the city itself had been ripped apart by the great beasts. What once had been a city of neatly laid stone and slate and perfectly straight cobbled streets had been transformed into channels of broken ground running through hills of rubble. Clouds of dust filled the air making it difficult to breathe and as the dust slowly settled he knew it would cover the remains of many of those who had once called the rubble home. Perhaps it would hide some of the horror. In the distance he could make out where the main gate to the city used to be. In its place there was now a huge gaping hole in the massive wall that ringed the entire city of Theria.

To add to the madness of it all he could see mammoths everywhere. No longer rampaging as the panic had apparently ended, they now stood quietly in the streets, thinking no doubt about food. It was a sight he would never have expected to see in his lifetime.

The beasts were as quick to calm as they were to panic so the stories went. But in the distance he could still hear the sound of thunder in the ground and the screams of people as some of the beasts still ran. Even these calmer ones still looked dangerously skittish. One wrong move, one loud noise, and they would start stampeding again. And when they did chaos would return.

“Sire!”

Someone was addressing him and he dimly realised that the man had been doing so for some time. He even had his hand on his shoulder and was shaking him as he tried to get his attention. And despite it being improper it was the right thing to do. This was a disaster and the people needed their king. Now more than ever they needed him. He could see that so very clearly in the faces of the guards surrounding him. They didn't know what to do. They needed orders. They needed something to make sense in the light of what had happened.

“Right, get everyone you can out of the broken buildings and away from the mammoths.” He started belting out orders to anyone who would listen, heedless of the chain of command. Normally he would instruct his right and left hands and they would do what needed to be done. But his left hand was away on a trade mission and he had no idea where his right hand was. Lord Julius could be dead.

“And no one approaches the mammoths. No shooting, no loud noises. Let the beasts calm down and pray they leave peaceably.”

The last thing they could afford he knew, was another stampede. The mammoths would have to be encouraged to leave by themselves. But at the same time he had no idea at all how to coax a mammoth to leave their city. Still, that was a matter for later. For the moment while things were calming down, they had to concentrate on getting the people to safety and not making things worse.

“Organise a triage area on the far side of the city, maybe even outside the walls, and get all the physicians and apothecaries you can find out to it. The wounded will need to be carried to it.”

“Get some fires lit and some cauldrons bubbling. I want everybody who can be found and needs food to be fed. Hot food. I want the stables cleared as best they can be, so that those who no longer have homes can at least have a roof over their heads for the night.”

“We need an inventory of what supplies we have; food, bandages, clothing, blankets, water. And we need to make sure that no one is left starving or cold. Not tonight.”

“And find me any of my advisers you can. We need to find some answers.”

And while those weren’t critical just yet, they would be. He could feel the anger deep down starting to bubble up. This was no accident. These beasts had not simply been grazing nearby when they'd started to run. Someone had done this. Someone had brought these beasts to Therion and then unleashed them outside his city. Someone had started them stampeding. And that someone had to be found.

He had to pay.

Looking back once more at the remains of his castle and the people that he knew lay dead within, he knew that whoever had done this had to pay dearly.

Chapter Two

It was late and Edouard was sleeping soundly when the thumping began. The impact of steel striking against the solid oak of his front door.

At first he tried to ignore it. He was comfortable and warm, and it was late. It was all surely some sort of bad dream. Besides, no one ever came to visit him. Or not many. A few adventurers and the like with relics they wanted to identify. The odd person wanting to sell him something. A few terrified escapees from the nearby Temple of Tyrel. And they didn't show up in the middle of the night. But if it was a dream it was a persistent one and the thumping continued, eventually forcing him to awaken fully. Even to open his eyes. Not that there was much to see. His bed chamber was dark, and whoever was banging was downstairs, beating on the front door. Maybe he should start closing the front gate in future he thought.

“It's late. Go away!”

Edouard was in no mood for visitors as he yelled from his bed at whoever it was banging on the door in the middle of the night. And he was really banging, probably hitting the huge oak doors with some sort of mace. If he hit them any harder he might even smash them out of their solid iron frames. Maybe whoever it was wasn't really knocking. Maybe he was actually trying to break the door down? Perhaps it was some sort of gang of hoodlums. Still, the bar would hold he knew. At least long enough for him to get to his pistols. Of course even as he thought about that he heard the truth yelled at him from outside.

“Get your useless bones out of bed little brother, or I'll haul them out and toss them on the cold, wet grass!”

“Marcus?” Of course it was Marcus. Who else would call him that? Who else could smash a door so hard? And Edouard knew his voice. But what was he doing thumping on his door in the middle of the night? What was he doing there at all? He lived ten leagues out of the city. Of course, wondering about it wasn't going to appease either his curiosity or his brother's demands.

“Coming you great oaf!”

He knew he had to as he threw off the covers and found his feet. Marcus was never the patient sort, and he would have made good on his threat, after knocking the doors down of course. When they were children he'd done that exact same thing many times.

“Sola.”

A quick word and a wave of his hand and the oil lanterns on the wall burst into life, turning Edouard's dark bed chamber into something far more welcoming with their golden glow. Sometimes it was useful having the spark, even if his family mostly considered it an embarrassment. And it gave him enough light to see his dressing gown draped over the end of the huge bed where he'd left it before retiring for the evening.

“Make it quick. It's an accursed hoar frost out here.”

It wasn't actually. Winter had left the lands once more, and it was quite mild. But his older brother had always felt the cold for some reason, and he was naturally impatient.

Tying his robe securely around his middle, Edouard hurried out of his room and descended the stairs, quickly sending another spark to the hearth in the great room, which had been banked for the night. It burst back into flame quite quickly.

At the bottom of the stairs he crossed the lobby, bare feet slapping on the marble tiles of the hallway, and found the bar to the front doors. A heartbeat later he had it up; the door was flung open, and his brother marched in, muttering under his breath about his tardiness and heading straight for the fire. Edouard couldn't help but notice he was in his full armour, the steel clad boots clattering on the marble floor of the entrance hall and then hammering into the wooden floorboards of the great room.

“Took you long enough. It's colder than a witch's tits out there.”

The steel armour explained some of his brother’s susceptibility to the cold. The armour always made both the heat and the cold worse. And even as he realised that Edouard had to wonder; why was he wearing the stuff anyway?

Usually Marcus made do with the symbolic accoutrements of his profession; an elegant cuirasse, pistol and sword, all of which could be worn with proper woollen britches, a decent white shirt over a vest and a uniform jacket. But not this night. This time the britches were gone in favour of leggings and steel plates to protect his thighs. He was wearing chain as well as his cuirasse and so the shirt had been sacrificed in place of a thin cotton vest. Instead of his fashionable jacket he was wearing a cape over his shoulders, an item of clothing that offered damned little protection against the cold. And rather than his normal elegant duelling pistol he was carrying the heavier weapon a soldier carried, and with it a heavy blade instead of a rapier. He was even carrying his helm under one arm. It was as though he was prepared to go into battle.

Of course in such a battle he would do well. He wasn't just as powerful as an ox, he was quick and he knew how to handle his weapons. But so too did many others. Where Marcus excelled and what would let him win through any battle, though you would never think it to look at him, was his knowledge of tactics and strategy. Buried inside that bulky body and hidden beneath his wild mop of jet black hair there was a surprisingly sharp mind.

“Go and sit by the fire and I'll see if I can find you some mulled wine.”

Edouard hurried off to the kitchen, one of the many rooms in the old fort he never visited, and then started hunting through the rows of cupboards for anything that looked like a bottle of the vintner's best. He usually kept some for winter evenings. But it took some hunting. The kitchen was really Mrs. Menzies' domain and he just enjoyed the fruits of her labours and stayed out of her way the rest of the time. No doubt she would have found the bottle in a heartbeat. But she unlike him surely had the good sense to be asleep in her bed in her home. Like the rest of Breakwater.

Meanwhile his brother was already standing in front of the fire place in the great hall, his boots thumping out a noisy staccato on the wooden floor as he tried to shake out the cold. Not for the first time Edouard considered the possibility of investing in more rugs. Marble tiles and wooden floor boards were cold on bare feet and noisy. But he was also acutely aware that more rugs meant more work for the servants as they had to beat them every few days, and he didn't want to have to hire any more. They just cluttered up his life and interfered with his work.

They also didn't seem to understand that there were rooms in the fort he didn't want cleaned. That his workshop in the basement was cluttered and dirty for a reason. It was a workshop! It was enough for him that they did some basic cooking and cleaning and then left him to his own devices.

Besides, this was a fort not a manor house. It was rough by its very nature. The floorboards were stained and treated to help them last, but not polished smooth. The walls were rough, consisting of heavy stones that had been laid and mortared together, but nothing more. And the windows were covered with sturdy cast iron grates. It was meant to be a little dirty. But trying to get the servants to understand that was nearly impossible.

“So why by the Seven are you wearing that get up in the middle of the night?” Edouard called out. “We're not at war.”

“Actually we just might be.”

“What? – Ow!” Startled by his words, Edouard looked around the corner through the kitchen door at his brother standing in front of the fire and immediately smashed his head against the side of one of the cupboards. After that he spent a little time nursing what was sure to become a lump and cursing, before his thoughts finally returned to the important matters.

“What in the seven hells are you talking about?” Even as he asked he finally spied the bottles sitting in the bottom of the larder, probably the place he should have looked first. He grabbed the nearest of them and rushed back out through the dining hall and into the great room with it before even hearing an answer.

“Theria was attacked.”

His brother told him the shocking news as Edouard dropped the bottle into its little steel basket above the fire and removed the stopper. For the longest while Edouard couldn't believe he was hearing him right. That bump on the head surely hadn't knocked any sense into him. But Marcus kept repeating himself, and embellishing his ludicrous tale with mammoths and magic much as he wished he wouldn't, and eventually he had to listen. Listen and think as he weighed up the details of the attack.

“A whole herd of mammoths? But they couldn’t have been marched here. They had to have been portalled in. And that portal would have had to span a thousand leagues or more from the northern lands where they live. That's not the magic of a spark like me. And even the two flames in Theria couldn't do it. They might have the strength but they aren't called to the magic of dimension. Linstrum is a summoner and Agatha has the magic of the earth.”

The king though would surely know that already. For most people magic was no more than a curiosity. They used the services of sparks like Janus the healer and Fergis, another spark of fire like him. And they knew the stories of the powers. The legends. But in their daily life they simply didn't need magic. The king however, was very much more aware of what a spark or a flame could do. King Byron understood the risks and the rewards it could offer. After this night’s events Edouard guessed he would be even more aware of them.

“Dimension magic on that scale belongs to the powers alone. At least in Therion.”

And they were beings that Edouard didn't want to mess with. No one did. Sparks like him were modest casters at best. Flames had far greater strength and control as the magic flowed through them like water. But the difference between even a flame and a power was the difference between an ant and a man. There was simply no comparison.

Sparks and flames had magic and they could draw on it. Powers by contrast were magic and as such they didn't have to call on their magic. It was always with them. No more did they have to shape the magic and cast it. Not the way sparks and flames did. There was no need for learning shapes or practice among the powers. They simply cast with a thought. They weren't bound to a particular affinity either. They could shape their magic however they chose. Fire, dimension, summoning, water. Any and every magical affinity was theirs to command. And then there was the strength. Some claimed that powers had no limits. The rest simply assumed that whatever their limits might be, they were far beyond anything mere mortals could understand.

Any of the three local powers could have opened the portal and sent the mammoths through. It would have been simplicity itself for them. But he couldn't imagine any of them doing such a thing. Which was extremely fortunate since he also couldn't think of a way to stop them if they had.

Yule would have no great interest in such things. The fire giant much preferred his riddling. In fact it was said that for most of his days he spent the hours crafting ever more complex riddles to send to the other powers. Whether they cared for them he didn't know. And as for Ascorlexia, the ancient black dragon loved to read. For weeks or months at a time he did no more than nap in his cave while his servants carried books to him and turned the pages as necessary. They also copied the books they collected for him and bound them into volumes large enough for a dragon to read. The dragon couldn't be bothered exerting himself enough to create such a portal. And that left only Tyrel, the hamadryad. Though she did pay at least a little interest in the outside world, she would have had nothing to do with the attack either as it would endanger women and children. Those she considered her charges.

Besides, the three powers had one other argument in their favour. They never left their homes. Why that was, he didn't know. No one did. But it still made it more unlikely that they would travel a dozen or more leagues to open a portal outside Theria and send through a herd of stampeding mammoths.

He told all of that to Marcus as he waited for the mulled wine to reach the right temperature and of course his brother nodded. Naturally he already knew the same. The king surely did too. He had known long before he'd sent Marcus to him. So what exactly did he think Edouard could help with? He knew no more than they. Naturally Marcus was saying nothing useful as he continued with his efforts to warm up. Just complaining.

When the mulled wine was finally warmed through he poured his brother a goblet. Of course Marcus downed it in a single gulp and instantly held out the goblet for more. He was never shy when it came to matters of wine and ale. But at least he was finally willing to say something useful again instead of just complaining about the cold and the draft in the fort.